The availability of computers to university faculty members and the capability of those computer systems have increased exponentially over the past several years; however, many faculty still do not use the technology. The extent of diffusion of the capabilities of computer-mediated communication (CMC) among faculty is a core issue. This paper surveys literature on CMC with regard to diffusion of the practice among faculty. Through interviews and case studies, the authors examine characteristics of faculty who are active users of CMC as well as those who do not use the communication technology. Possible barriers to a more widespread use are examined, and implications for further research are discussed.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>

E-mail style has received little attention from corporations and other institutions. The absence of stylistic guidelines may create problems: communicating inappropriately with some audiences, losing sight of the message purpose, or wasting company resources in other ways. To solve such problems, technical communicators can use their unique abilities to promote e-mail formats that consider the strengths and limitations of the medium in addition to the traditional concerns with audience, purpose, and content of messages.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>

This paper reports a survey on how users maintain context in an electronic mail (e-mail) dialogue and, in particular, the use of quoting as a response strategy. The target group belonged to a community of experienced users of computer-mediated communication systems: readers of Usenet newsgroups. The results showed that quoting a message, i.e., including it in a comment or reply, was a widely used technique in e-mail dialogues, but that the majority of respondents used it selectively. Factors that affected the use of quoting were the category of receiver and the length and nature of the message. Contrary to expectations, the results showed that users perceived the use of quoting as contributing to the sense of conversation when communicating in e-mail.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>

Kenneth Burke's New Rhetoric (1951) was meant to describe language as the basis of the interaction of individuals, objects, and courses of events in the human communication process. However, his theory can also be a useful rhetorical model to explain hypertext as a language event that relies on nested dialogues of visible text and invisible scripting. Moreover, Burke's belief that the purpose of discourse is to share knowledge with others provides a striking parallel to Vannevar Bush's original theory about hypertext. Even Burke's metaphor of a drama fits the purpose and process of hypertext.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>

This essay explores legal and ethical issues related to electronic mail (e-mail) systems in the United States and Canada. Among the recommendations made, based on analysis of actual cases, are: better education in computer-telecommunications technologies should be provided for government officials to enable them to make and uphold appropriate laws concerning electronic mail; clear published policies, consistent with the law and with the professional ethics of users, should be developed for e-mail systems; access to up-to-date legal information should be available to computer system operators and those who employ them; and ongoing monitoring of legal and ethical issues related to computer-telecommunications technologies (and applications such as e-mail) is needed to maximize the democratic potential of the Information Age.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>

This paper presents a longitudinal case study of the introduction of voice mail, applying media richness theory to develop and assess a set of 16 tasks with varying levels of equivocality, and to compare different media. Through t-tests, reliability, factor, and multidimensional scaling analyses, evaluation of task equivocality and voice mail is discussed and potential shortcomings of current approaches are highlighted. Results show that equivocality does not seem to be unidimensional and includes aspects of authority across organizational boundaries. Across all tasks, telephone would be most likely selected by respondents, but face-to-face and telephone were more likely to be selected for more equivocal tasks. Unlike prior studies, voice mail is perceived as similar to documents and face-to-face.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>

The application of computer tools to mediating and promoting collaborative design efforts between mutually distant parties has become feasible. Technology is again ahead of practice, and problems of assimilation have only begun to be explored. This paper postulates the requirements of environments for computer-mediated collaborative design in architectural practice, drawing upon experiences of design collaboration among schools of architecture on three continents and supplementing these with enquiries into design excellence in practice.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>

The demand for help and hypertext systems has created a problem for many documentation departments, particularly those in smaller companies inexperienced in creating these forms of online documentation. The scarcity of existing literature compounds this problem. Literature that specifically addresses how to create such systems with limited resources and considerable time constraints would ease the burden faced by these companies. This article gives writers in small companies with limited resources some suggestions for undertaking a hypertext project. The writer views help text as a simple form of hypertext, and, as such, frequently refers to both simply as “hypertext.” This article is not concerned with describing in detail the various design features of hypertext.

Communication at a Distance: The Influence of Print on Sociological Organization and Change1y. David S. Kaufer and Kathleen M. Carley. Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1993. 474 pp. Writing and Reading Mental Health Records. John F. Reynolds, David C. Mair, and Pamela C. Fischer. Newbury Park, London, New Delhi: Sage, 1992. 109 pp. Designing, Writing, and Producing Computer Documentation. Lynn Denton and Jody Kelly. New York: McGraw, 1992. 258 pp. Writing in the Workplace: New Research Perspectives. Rachel Spilka, ed. Carbondale and Edwardsville: Southern Illinois UP, 1993. 332 pp. *

This study proceeds from the assumption that computers do not function as independent variables in classrooms, but rather as part of a complex network of social and pedagogical interactions. It examines the integration of computers into the writing practices of a remedial English class in an urban high school. Computers and word processors were introduced midway into the school year. The class was observed and recorded daily throughout the academic year, and all written work was collected. Six students were selected for in-depth focus as they carried out writing tasks. Analysis focuses on how classroom writing practices were structured and carried out and how students participated in writing tasks before and after the computers arrived. Although many changes accompanied the use of computers, the study concludes that the teacher's structuring of writing instruction had the greatest impact on both student writing and the ways computers entered into that writing.

Part 1 Perspectives: education by engagement and construction - a strategic education initiative for a multimedia renewal of American education, Ben Shneiderman is there a class in this text? creating knowledge in the electronic classroom, John M. Slatin varieties of virtual - expanded metaphors for computer-mediated learning, Patricia Ann Carlson cognitive architecture in hypermedia instruction, Henrietta Nickels Shirk multimedia - informational alchemy or conceptual typography?, Evelyn Schlusselberg and V. Judson Harward dimensions, context, and freedom - the library in the social creation of knowledge, Gregory T. Anderson multimedia and the library and information studies curriculum, Kathleen Burnett the virtual museum and related epistemological concerns, Glen Hoptman an epistemic analysis of the interaction between knowledge, education, and technology, David Chen the many faces of multimedia - how new technologies might change the nature of the academic endeavour, Alison Hartman, et al. Part 2 . . . and practices: bootstrapping hypertext - student-created documents, intermedia, and the social construction of knowledge, George P. Landow the CUPLE project - a hyper- and multimedia approach to restructuring physics education, E.F. Redish, et al collaborative virtual communities - using Learning Constellations, a multimedia ethnographic research tool, Ricki Goldman-Segall the crisis management game of Three Mile Island - using multimedia simulation in management education, Thomas M. Fletcher restructuring space, time, story, and text in advanced multimedia learning environments, Janet H. Murray the virtual classroom - software for collaborative learning, Starr Roxanne Hiltz medical centre - a modular hypermedia approach to programme design, Nels Anderson prototyping multimedia - lessons from the visual computing group at project Athena Centre for educational computing initative, Ben Davis Engineering-Design Instructional Computer System (EDICS), David Gordon Wilson computers and design activities - their mediating role in engineering education, Shahaf Gal the need for negotiation in cooperative work, Beth Adelson and Troy Jordan teaching hypermedia concepts using hypermedia techniques, Peter A. Gloor computer integrated documentation, Guy Boy the Worcester State College Elder Connection - using multimedia and information technology to promote intergenerational education, Virginia Z. Ogozalek, et al paradoxical reactions and powerful ideas - educational computing in a Department of Physics, Sherry Turkle.

Computers and technology now enable the writer of a form letter to insert significant personal information about the individual recipient, the purpose of which is to induce compliance with the sender's purposes. This article is based on a project in producing medical advice letters tailored to individuals. Our evaluations, like other preliminary studies, suggest that individualizing such letters does improve compliance over the conventional (impersonal) form letter. In considering the inner logic of the individualized letter, different methods of forming personalized letters are presented: adding text, subtracting text, and rearranging text. It is shown how the requisite information can be represented by a questionnaire, a diagram, and the printed letter itself. These three components are logically connected so that the user can make various choices and letters can be quickly formulated. Finally, advice is offered to technical writers embarking on the development of an individualized form letter, with some general reflections about the future of this innovation.

This study investigated the need to include computer screens in documentation for software using a graphical user interface. Minimal manual principles emphasize the need to reduce verbiage. However, some suggest that depiction of screens in documentation can help the user coordinate documentation with computer screen displays. Documentation including button, icon, and screen information was varied with software designed for file transfers. College students used one of the three manuals designed along minimal manual principles. Students who used a manual with screens were significantly slower in transferring files and found it less helpful than students using either a manual with button and icon information or one with textual information only. Therefore, documentation for graphical user interfaces should include few, if any, screens. However, there appears to be a benefit for including icon and button information in the documentation.

English in America: A Radical View of the Profession and The Politics of Letters , Richard Ohmann John Trimbur Writing in the Academic Disciplines, 1870-1990: A Curricular History , David R. Russell Martha A. Townsend How Writers Teach Writing, Nancy Kline Janis Forman Reading as RhetoricalAction: Knowledge, Persuasion, and the Teaching of Research-Based Writing, Doug Brent Christina Haas Understanding ESL Writers, Ilona Leki Liz Hamp-Lyons Assessing Second Language Writing in Academic Contexts, Liz Hamp-Lyons Ilona Leki Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Literacy Research, Richard Beach, Judith L. Green, Michael L. Kamil, and Timothy Shanahan Dan Madigan Literacy Online: The Promise (and Peril) of Reading and Writing with Computers, Myron C. Tuman Christine M. Neuwirth

Literacy and Technology, Myron C. Tuman. Part 1 Computers and New Forms of Texts: Literature in the Electronic Writing Space, Jay David Bolter Opening Hypertext - A Memoir, Ted Nelson. Part 2 Computers and New Forms of Teaching English: Hypertext, Metatext, and the Electronic Canon, George Landow Dominion Everywhere - Computers as Cultural Artifacts, Helen Schwartz. Part 3 Computers and New Forms of Critical Thought: Looking Out - The Impact of Computers on the Lives of Professionals, Stanley Aronowitz Grammatology (in the Stacks) of Hypermedia - A Simulation, Greg Ulmer. Part 4 Computers and New Forms of Administrative Control: The Electronic Panopticon - Censorship, Control, and Indoctrination in a Post-Typographic Culture, Eugene Provenzo Naturalizing the Computer - English Online, Victor Raskin. Part 5 Computers and New Forms of Knowledge: Digital Rhetoric - Theory, Practice, and Property, Richard Lanham How We Knew, How We Know, How We Will Know, Pamela McCorduck. Final Thoughts, Myron C. Tuman.

Recent advances in computer technology make networking an essential skill for the technical communicator. Particularly, the development of local, national, and international computer networks has created a collaborative writing environment. At the heart of the Internet network is the UNIX operating system. The open architecture of UNIX makes it a superior tool for collaborative writing, in the classroom, across the campus, or internationally. Central to the open system is UNIX's mode of allowing users to set file access permissions, restricting some files while allowing others to be open to the public.

Two studies were conducted in order to investigate the technical communication practices of Russian and US aerospace engineers and scientists. Both studies had the same five objectives: to solicit the opinions of aerospace engineers and scientists regarding the importance of technical communication to their professions; to determine the use and production of technical communication by aerospace engineers and scientists; to seek their views about the appropriate content of the undergraduate course in technical communication; to determine aerospace engineers' and scientists' use of libraries, technical information centers, and online databases; and to determine the use and importance of computer and information technology to them. Responses to a self-administered questionnaire that was distributed to Russian aerospace engineers and scientists at the Central Aero-Hydrodynamic Institute (TsAGI) and to their US counterparts at the NASA Ames Research Center and the NASA Langley Research Center are presented.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>

Communication at the human-computer interaction level, is discussed. The presentation layer, or user interface, to computer programs acts as a shield to a far more complex array of processes. Using simple navigational and functional commands, the user can manipulate a computer program and achieve desired results quickly. This is not always the case, however, and deficiencies in both usability and information access continue to plague ordinary computer users. With increasing public reliance on computer-generated information, powerful computer applications must be amenable to nontechnical users. The most commercially viable and prominent of these efforts are explored, with particular emphasis on the evolving role of artificially intelligent technologies.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>

The early planning of a project organization and process is critical to the eventual success of a large, complex project. Beth Israel Medical Center, a 1180 bed teaching hospital in New York City, embarked in 1991 on a plan to implement clinical information computer systems throughout its facilities. This project is described. The project manager considered the unique cultural and organizational aspects of Beth Israel in order to develop a strategy for the project. Strategy objectives included promoting broad educational awareness, establishing quick project momentum and visibility, gaining the approval of a competing organizational department, and developing a productive and effective project team. The start-up phase of any project can make or break the project. If one does not set the correct tone and build the correct organization, one can easily doom the project before it has ever had a chance to develop.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>

This study investigated the effectiveness of an approach to improving revising skills that integrated strategy instruction, peer response, and word processing. Seventh and eighth grade students with learning disabilities were taught a systematic strategy for working in pairs to help each other revise their writing. The strategy was designed to guide students in both the social and cognitive aspects of response and revision. Cognitive support included a set of evaluation criteria, specific revision strategies, and an overall strategy for regulating the revision process. Social interaction was guided by a predictable structure for listening and responding to each others’ writing. A multiple probe design across pairs was used to assess instruction. On the pretests, students made few substantive revisions and did not improve the quality of their papers by revising them. Following instruction, all students made more substantive revisions, the proportion of revisions rated as improvements increased from 47% to 83%, and second drafts were rated as significantly better than first drafts. Furthermore, the overall quality of final drafts increased substantially from pretests to posttests. The gains were maintained at one and two-month maintenance testing and generalized to handwritten compositions.

The authors discuss a case history of technology transfer from a government laboratory to industry, to other laboratories, and to universities. The technology transferred is a computer program named KIVA that simulates air flow, fuel sprays, and combustion in practical combustion devices such as a automobile and truck engines, gas turbines that power jet aircraft, and industrial furnaces, heaters, and waste incinerators. The success of the transfer process derives not from presenting a finished product, but rather from working closely with KIVA users at every stage of development. By making the original source code available to a broad user community, a second avenue of transfer occurs as university engineering departments prepare students to enter industry.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>

Twenty years ago I had no idea what a computer was. Ten years ago I knew what computers were, but I had never sat at a terminal. I just assumed that computers were machines used in those “other” disciplines, certainly not in English courses. Today, I teach my technical writing classes in a collaborative computer classroom. The classroom consists of twelve networked computers which my twenty-four students per class use in tandem. Despite my original ignorance of computers, I'm now happily ensconced in a computer classroom. In fact, computers are so important, I've concluded, that teaching writing without the aid of computers does our students a disservice. How did I make such a complete turn-around in attitude? I realized that far from being anathema, computers helped to create a perfect marriage for teaching and writing. First, computers let students write more effectively because computers are compatible with the writing process (writing and rewriting). Next, teaching students to write in a collaborative computer environment prepares our students for business and industry where they will be asked to work on group projects and to communicate electronically. Despite the values of computerizing our instruction, however, computers in the classroom present problems. Do the benefits outweigh the deficits? My answer is yes.

Over the past decade researchers, instructors, and people in industry and academia have begun to understand the value of teaching people how to collaborate. This selected annotated bibliography compiles some of the theories and research on collaboration from disciplines such as small group management, composition, scientific and technical communication, computer science, speech communication, and rhetoric. It also includes relevant sources from the popular press.

(Inter)views: Cross-disciplinary Perspectives on Rhetoric and Literacy, Gary A. Olson and Irene Gale Douglas Vipond Contending with Words: Composition and Rhetoric in a Postmodern Age, Patricia Harkin and John Schilb Stephen M. North Rereading the Sophists: Classical Rhetoric Refigured, Susan C. Jarratt James D. Williams Portfolios: Process and Product, Pat Belanoff and Marcia Dickson Edward M. White Assigning, Responding, Evaluating: A Writing Teacher’s Guide, Edward M. White Karen L. Greenberg Evolving Perspectives on Computers and Composition Studies: Questionsfor the 1990s, Gail E. Hawisher and Cynthia L. Selfe Mary G. French Pain and Possibility: Writing Your Way through Personal Crisis, Gabriele Rico JoAnn Campbell

This article discusses two communication issues associated with the development of an Executive Information System. The first issue examines the natural communication between systems designers and the executive end-user. The second issue addresses the human-computer interaction between the computer and the executive. Top executives constitute a unique group of end-users, and systems designers should exercise a wide range of skills in the process of identifying needs and presenting information to them.

Establishing a course in desktop publishing at the college level is an enterprise that requires important and sometimes difficult choices, such as selecting hardware and software, textbooks, and types of assignments. For faculty members who are involved in making those decisions, the need for information from people who have had experience in teaching desktop publishing is critical. Experience shows that a sound course in this area can be created with these elements: IBM-compatible computers, color monitors, mice, a scanner, one or two laser printers, Aldus PageMaker®, CorelDRAW™, Microsoft® Windows™, Harvard Graphics®, a couple of good textbooks, both practice and original projects, and an emphasis on principles of good design.

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In classes ranging from Advanced Expository and Women and at the undergraduate level to Gender, Language, and Writing Pedagogy and Classical and Contemporary Rhetoric at the graduate level, I have invited students to imagine the possibilities for new forms of discourse, new kinds of academic essays. I do because I believe that writing classes (and the whole field of composition studies) must employ richer visions of texts and composing processes. If are to invent a truly pluralistic society, must envision a socially and politically situated view of language and the creation of texts-one that takes into account gender, race, class, sexual preference, and a host of issues that are implied by these and other cultural differences. Our language and our written texts represent our visions of our culture, and need new processes and forms if are to express ways of thinking that have been outside the dominant culture. Finally, I believe that teaching students to write involves teaching them ways to critique not only their material and their potential readers' needs, but also the rhetorical conventions that they are expected to employ within the academy. Work in composition has been expanded enormously by theories of cognitive processes, social construction, and by the uses of computers and other forms of technology, yet, as Adrienne Rich writes, we might hypothetically possess ourselves of every recognized technological resource on the North American continent, but as long as our language is inadequate, our vision remains formless, our thinking and feeling are still running in the old cycles, our process may be 'revolutionary,' but not transformative (Rich 247-48). David Kaufer and Cheryl Geisler argue that freshmen composition and writing across the curriculum have remained silent about newness as a rhetorical standard, as a hallmark of literacy in a post-industrial, professional age. They do not believe that this silence can be justified on either intellectual or pragmatic grounds . (309).